I have been very busy this month at the Firestation. I have just completed a collagraph for the Firestation Print Studio exhibition "After Image",for which artists have been asked to create work inspired by a particular artist, style or school of painting.  Having travelled in India earlier this year, my inspiration for this piece has been the paintings of Rajasthan (in particular those from the Royal Court of Jodhpur). In my print titled "Garden of Eden" I have tried to recreate the stylized, flat shapes of the trees and plants which typically appear in the Jodhpur paintings. I have also tried to incorporate the vibrant green colours used by those artists.I have made a number of tree/plant stencils from cardboard and have also used coloured tissue paper as chin colle in some parts of the image. As a first attempt at this style, I'm quite pleased with the result.There are a few technical issues that I would deal with differently if I were to make another print. I think I'll probably attempt a couple more in this style as part of a series on the Garden of Eden.
Also, this month, as part of our Open Studios and exhibition  "The Artful Line", I gave a talk titled "Printmaking Demystified". My idea was to pitch the talk at people, who are not artists, but who are  interested in understanding the broad range of printmaking techniques. The talk was held in our print workshop and so as I was talking, fellow artist, Margaret Manchee was able to demonstrate pulling a linocut image as well as the inking up and printing of an etching. The exhibited prints in the gallery also gave people the opportunity to view different types of printmaking. The talk was really well patronised and from the feedback it seems that those attending came away with a better understanding of what's involved in printmaking.
After the talk, all the artists in residence opened their studios to visitors this was also well patronised. We hope to repeat both the talk and open studios later this year.